Single
Sign-On
This feature allows a user
with a domain account to log on once (via a password or smart card) and
access RD Session Host servers and virtual desktops without being
prompted for credentials again.
The following are some
important considerations when using Single Sign-On:
Single Sign-On is
supported from Windows 7, Windows Vista, or Windows XP with Service Pack
3 clients to a Windows Server 2008 Terminal Server or Windows Server
2008 R2 RD Session Host server. This feature is also supported between
Windows Server 2008 R2 to Windows Server 2008 servers or vice versa.
The remote machine that a client
is connecting to must be authenticated via Kerberos or a server
authentication certificate such as SSL. Or, an administrator must enable
the Allow Default Credentials with NTLM-Only Server Authentication
policy.
When saved
credentials for a remote machine are already present, those credentials
take precedence over the current credentials.
Remote Desktop
Connection Display
In the Remote Desktop
Connection 6.0 client (and carried over to RDC 7.0), support was added
for several new features that are geared toward improving the end-user
experience: custom display resolutions, horizontal monitor spanning
across multiple monitors, Desktop Experience, Font Smoothing, and
Display Data Prioritization.
Custom Display
Resolutions
In the previous Terminal
Services Client, only 4:3 display resolution ratios and a maximum
resolution of 1600×1200 were supported. In the new client, additional
display resolution ratios, such as 16:9 or 16:10, and maximum resolution
of 4096×2048 are now supported.
There are two ways to set a
custom display resolution. The first method is to edit an .rdp file with a text editor. In the file, add or
change the following settings:
desktopheight:i:<value>
desktopwidth:i:<value>
The variable <value> should be defined as the desired resolution. The second
method is to define the custom resolution from the command prompt:
Monitor Spanning
With the monitor spanning
feature, a Remote Desktop session can now be spanned across multiple
monitors. To use this feature, the monitors used must meet the following
requirements:
The monitors must use the same resolution.
The monitors must be aligned horizontally.
The total resolution across all monitors cannot exceed
4096×2048.
Monitor spanning can be
enabled using two methods. The first method is to edit an .rdp file with a text editor. In the file, add or change
the following setting: Span:i:<value>.
<value> = 0, monitor spanning is
disabled
<value> = 1, monitor
spanning is enabled
The second method is to enable
spanning from the command prompt:
Desktop Experience
The Desktop Experience feature
is used to make a desktop session on an RD Session Host server look and
feel like a Windows 7 desktop. When enabled, this feature does the
following things:
Installs a Windows
7–like desktop, which then enables features such as Windows Media
Player, desktop themes, photo management, and so on
Allows another feature
called Desktop Composition to function; Desktop Composition is used for
Windows Aero over a Remote Desktop Connection
Note
Desktop Composition is
not supported on a multiple monitor–based Remote Desktop session.
Font Smoothing
An RD Session Host server can provide ClearType
functionality to clients via a feature called Font Smoothing. ClearType
is a feature that is used to display fonts such that they are clearer
and smoother on displays such as an LCD monitor.
By default, ClearType is
enabled in Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2. To enable
Font Smoothing, use the following procedure on a Remote Desktop
Connection client:
1. | Open the
Remote Desktop Connection client.
|
2. | In the Remote Desktop Connection dialog box, click
Options.
|
3. | Now select
the Experience tab, and select the Font Smoothing check box.
|
Display Data
Prioritization
In past versions of
Terminal Services, a user’s remote session would often become frozen
when printing or transferring files. In Windows Server 2008, a feature
called Display Data Prioritization was introduced. By design, this
feature gives display, keyboard, and mouse data a higher priority over
other virtual channel traffic. The result of this design is that virtual
channel traffic, such as disk or file transfers, does not adversely
affect a user’s ability to interact with a remote session.
By default, the
bandwidth ratio with the Display Data Prioritization feature is 70:30.
This means that 70% of the bandwidth is reserved for display and input
data and 30% is reserved for all other traffic. An administrator can
adjust the bandwidth ratios by changing the following Registry values on
a Terminal Server or RD Session Host server under the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TermDD
subkey:
FlowControlDisable—
Enables and disables flow control
FlowControlDisplayBandwidth— Determines relative bandwidth priority for display (and input
data)
FlowControlChannelBandwidth— Determines relative bandwidth priority for
other virtual channels
FlowControlChargePostCompression— Determines bandwidth allocation based on
precompression or postcompression bytes
New RDC Display
Features
The following are new RDC
display features that are introduced in Windows Server 2008 R2 Remote
Desktop Services:
